


Broken Teacups

by Dreadful Weather Today (TearoomSaloon)



Series: Trinkets [8]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Ko No Mono Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-11
Updated: 2014-05-11
Packaged: 2018-01-24 07:49:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1597208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TearoomSaloon/pseuds/Dreadful%20Weather%20Today
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She's so worried. About him, about her, about them. She can't make heads or tails of who anyone is, and she's scared, she's so scared. She needs to touch him, to feel that he's human under all those layers. She needs to know she'll be safe.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Broken Teacups

Her hands are trembling on the wheel the whole drive. The night has cascaded down around her car, seamlessly trapping her in this unending state of doubt and fear. Doubt and fear that made her get into the car, and doubt and fear that won’t let her leave the car.

His porch light is on, cheering and bright in the winter cold. She exhales and wraps her scarf tighter around her pretty pale neck. She’s still cloaked in blue, deep blue,  _his_  blue. It hurts her, this color. It bites into her skin, her mind, her lungs. It bites like the cold on her ears as she ascends his steps, standing before his grand wood door.

She slams the knocker frantically against its polished plate. praying that for some reason he won’t be there, that he won’t be home.

_Doubt, doubt, doubt, doubt._

He’s home, of course. She knew. She saw his Bentley perched to leave the drive. His eyebrows raise at the sight of her and she pushes her way in wordlessly, nervous and scared. Her cheeks are already hot and she can feel the sting of tears threatening against her eyes.

It takes her all of a minute to break. He barely has the door closed and already she’s a cracked teacup on his floor. Her coat is half-off and her pieces have spilled everywhere.

He takes her into his strong arms, holding her sobs against his chest. He shushes her, strokes her hair. She’s terrified, but she needs this. She needs to feel him under her palms, whatever he is. She needs to know that he is flesh and blood, mortal and man. She can’t understand how he could be, but she needs to think he is.

Freddie’s alive.

Freddie’s alive, and she’s not sure who Hannibal is anymore.

 _What_  Hannibal is anymore.

He kisses her forehead and shivers spike down her back. She doesn’t want to love him. She doesn’t want this. She can’t stop. She can’t, she can’t—

"Is everything all right?"

His baritone rumbles through her ribs. It was sweet and musical a week ago, but now…now she’s not sure, so she shakes her head.

"Whatever it is, it’ll be all right," he whispers, his fingers tracing circles down her back. "I promise."

"You can’t promise." Her voice is shaky, choked, and thick. "That’s the problem, Hannibal, you  _can’t_  promise.”

"I can promise that you won’t get hurt." He squeezes her tighter. "I can promise that much, Alana dear."

It’s a bullet to her chest. It confirms it to her, she thinks. That’s what she came here for. She’s satisfied, but still it hurts, burns. “I love you,” she says into his chest. “I love you  _so much_ **.** ”

"And I love you so much, my little songbird." He tips her chin up and kisses the tears from her stained cheeks.

"Can you promise not to hurt me?"

The realization hits his face and his dark eyes light up. He seems pleased, but she thinks he’s sad somehow. Upset that all the toys he’s made keep breaking in his hands. His smile cuts her.

"I can promise I’ll cut the fingers off anyone who dares the mere thought." He keeps kissing her hands, her cheeks, her forehead. His humanity is made raw by her fear of him; he’s angry with himself for worrying her. He’s angry with himself for cracking her, the one toy he didn’t want to shape. "I can promise you’ll always be safe near me."

She’s burying her hands under his suit jacket now, trying to make sure he’s real, needing to be ever-closer. It hurt. Her best friend, her closest ally, her lover—her  _one_  serious lover—

The  _I love yous_  fly from her lips until the sun peeks through his windows. He holds her until they’re basked in the fair morning light. He holds her tightly, moving her from his foyer to his den, arms around her from his divan to his bed, telling her poems, singing small words in a low croon. Whispering his own  _I love yous_  until she calmed down.

She thinks he’s lying to her. But she also thinks he’s telling the truth. He presses his forehead to hers and he nuzzles her neck, perpetually gentle, perpetually affectionate, perpetually loving. He could have removed his mask hours ago, but he didn’t, and is doing everything in his power to make her feel comfortable, secure,  _loved._

She doesn’t know what to think.


End file.
